It’s the season of starting rides in the dark – regardless of whether it’s morning or evening – and the time for hanging around at night wrapped up in as many layers as possible while still sweating profusely. Yup, autumn and winter are on their way, so it’s time to get digging for winter tights, break out the cosy base layers and the night riding lights before discovering that the tights have holes in, you didn’t wash the base layer and it’s crawled off to start a colony and your batteries now last as long as a four year old iPhone.

With that in mind, here’s Fresh Goods Friday…

Exposure Lights Diablo Mk4

The fourth incarnation of the Diablo is a tiny, alloy bodied powerhouse, fitting three CREE LEDs and a 3,100mAh Lithium ion battery into its 108g bulk. It kicks out 1,100 lumens at full power for a runtime of 1 hour, but with the new Optimised Mode Selector, you can pick from a range of levels and cycle settings to suit whatever you’re doing. It uses their very neat and secure helmet mount, though it can be fixed to the bars. It’s charged via USB using a gold plated port at the back – which can also be used to power other lights or even other USB accessories…

Vulpine Short Sleeve Merino Polo

Chipps has been suffering from Wiggo-fever (that’s what we believe they’re calling it) ever since the Summer of Bike Love began. Not content with donning fake mutton chops, he’s now got a taste for the polo neck shirts too. This particular item is made from beautifully soft Merino wool and is designed for use on or off the bike. As well as the small front pocket, there’s also one at the back complete with reflective trim.

Vulpine Women’s Merino Button Jersey

Vulpine also make this women’s specific Merino jersey. Despite looking nice and casual, it’s got some well thought out technical features such as the silicone gripper waist, subtle reflective detail on the back and the three pockets are designed to sit well with rucksacs, with two angled side pockets and a single zippered pocket mounted low down and centrally.

If you’re wondering who our new model is, then world, meet Grace – Singletrack’s new junior designer. She’s going to be joining crayon sets with our Sim to create almost every shade of Crayola there is – and she’s a dab hand with MS Paint as well, so expect big things from our upcoming digital issues…

Gamut P38

With the delivery 0f the Value-Hucking™ Shimano Zee groupset last week, Chipps has been assembling all the bits he needs to create a bike than can shred the gnar into extremely small dimensions. Of course, there’s no point even lining up on the lip of that 35ft huck if your chain is going to fall off as you slam the tranny, so Madison have kindly provided their latest P38 single ring chaindevice. The bashguard is made from tough polycarbonate, the boomerang backing plate is CNC’d alloy and the lower slider uses a simple but effective rubber band to keep the chain running smoothly.

Giro Ambient Cycling cap

Grace is keeping her ears warm with the magical Windstopper properties of Giro’s Ambient cap. As well as the windstopper front panel, it has a DWR coating to help resist rain. All the seams are flatlocked to keep it comfy when worn under a helmet and there’s a nice fleece liner on the inside too.

Giro Peloton cap

If you like a spot of old school roadie style and practicality with modern materials, this could be right up your street. A simple cycling cap with flatlock seams made from wicking materials – and they’re available in a load of colours too..

Gore Bike Wear Countdown SO hoodie and Alp X 2.0 AS 3/4 pants

The beautifully groomed Ben from Gore popped in yesterday to show us what’s new – and there’s plenty. The masters of the functional and technical have gone a bit more lifestyle on us, with a range of clothing that’s designed to work superbly but also look a bit more casual. Chipps is modelling the Windstopper softshell Countdown hoodie (£139.99), which has a slightly more relaxed ‘freeride cut’ but keeps a spot of reflective taping, plenty of pockets and a close fitting hood for the really minging weather. To keep his legs dry he’s got the waterproof and breathable Gore-Tex Alp X 2.0 3/4 length shorts (£129.99). They’ve got an elasticated waist with high back to keep spray firmly out, a zipped back pocket and adjustable width legs to control the fit. It looks like they’ll go over kneepads too, but we’ll have to test that out…

As Bruce Lee said, my style is no style – and Jon’s style is no style at all. He’s using the Primaloft insulated Alp X vest (£129.99) to keep nice and warm with its Windstopper outer. Think of it as a belay jacket for mountain bikers – the sort of thing you can stuff in your bag in miserable days and then use to keep warm when you stop for food or faff.

The Alp X 2.0 gloves (£49.99) use a water resistant and windproof soft shell outer to keep you warm and dry, with a gel padded palm, silicone finger grippers and long velcro cuffs to seal you in nicely.

Gore Bike Wear Alp X 2.0 GT AS jacket

Chipps is marvelling at the magical properties of the top end Gore waterproof jacket. It’s lightweight, very waterproof and extremely breathable thanks to the Gore Tex Active material used. It comes with detachable hood, stretch inserts on the back and arm, fold out tail for spray and waterproof napoleon pocket at the front and stow pocket on the rear. If you’re set on refusing to believe that it’s raining, this is the jacket for you…

GrahamS: It’s not removable or hideable, but it is very elasticated round the rim so it shouldn’t act like too much of a giant neck-bucket, but we’ll find that out when we get it outdoors.

Alcopop: They do come in black 😉

Northwind: I took it nightriding the other night and it’s an extremely impressive torch. Excellent beam pattern/spread, colour, intensity, very secure and it made the claimed 800 lumen light on my bars look really quite poor in comparison. You pays your money, you takes your choice. We’ll have a full review soon though…